The geometrical optics theory of modal waves propagating along optical waveguides is described. The theory is general and thus applicable to the general classes of inhomogeneous waveguides including aniso‐tropic media. This paper points out that the light ray, which is the fundamental concept in geometrical optics, is to be definable as the energy ray and the wave‐normal ray. The variational principles valid for these two definitions are explained. The energy ray is the well‐known ray that shows the path of energy transport. The wave‐normal ray is defined to be the locus of the wave‐normal vectors perpendicular to the wavefronts. The variational principles that describe these two rays are different, and therefore the ray equations for both rays are different in anisotropic media. The former is known as Hamiltonian optics, but the latter is not yet established as geometrical optics. It is pointed out that the latter should be used to describe the geometrical behaviors of guided modes and the propagation of modal waves without any logical contradiction. Optics describing guided modes in terms of the wave‐normal rays is called guided wave optics, and some differences from Hamiltonian optics are discussed using several examples.